Thank you for your unsatisfactory reply which you have noted but dismissed in its entirety.

I admire your loyalty towards being committed to supporting your staff. However, whilst there remains any form of doubt about the McCanns, do you not think it is a duty to protect the public from potential Fraud?

Whilst you may disagree with the points I make, I make them from the Final Report of the Portuguese Police who have investigated this case and have concluded that Maddie died in the apartment, which makes the McCanns fund fraudulent. It is, therefore, of public concern that your website links directly to the McCanns website where people, who are not aware of the Portuguese Police Final Report, are invited to donate to a Fund which cannot possibly locate Madeleine given that she is dead. We all know that the McCanns have used this public money to pay their mortgage. Is this what you are supporting? You are supporting a fraudulent Fund that pays their mortgage? If you intend to keep misleading the public with your support of the McCanns by using a public hospital online noticeboard, should you not at least put a disclaimer on your site telling people that their donations might be used for mortgage payments?

Given the nature of the evidence found in the McCanns apartment and hire car, might I ask in what way you are committed to finding Madeleine given that the sniffer dogs detected not only blood, but death?

Regardless of how many people at the Leicester hospitals know the McCanns personally, it is not acceptable to deliberately mislead members of the public just because the McCanns say they are innocent. The police do not say they are innocent. I would rather believe the police, who have spent over a year investigating them, than the McCanns who deliberately neglected their children, and put them in obvious danger, for the sake of a tapas meal. That, in itself, should require you to take all mention of their fraudulent fund off your hospital online noticeboard. It is ethically and morally proper to do so.

I will now go even further to ask if you think it is important to support your patients and protect them from any kind of risk, particularly where negligence is involved?

Dr Gerry McCann, and even Dr David Payne who also works at LRI, are guilty of child neglect at the very least - the entire group of doctors left their children unattended every night of their holiday. The McCanns sedated their children so they could go out drinking. This is abuse aswell as negligence. Negligence so serious that Madeleine is believed to be dead, based on the evidence of two British sniffer dogs. You will know that the sniffer dogs detected the scent of death in the McCanns apartment and in the car they hired 25 days later.

Should patients be subjected to treatment from doctors who admit negligence? Indeed, should patients be allowed to be in contact with a doctor who is believed to be involved in the death of his daughter and concealment of her body? Should a patient also be subjected to treatment by Dr David Payne who is suspected of paedophilia, as given in a witness statement to the Portuguese police?

What Rights have your patients got when you decide that they can be treated by doctors such as these, simply because you know the family? Yes, the case has been shelved pending further evidence - but the McCanns have NOT been cleared of any involvement. Mr Amaral stated quite clearly: "It is not a declaration of innocence" that the case has been shelved pending further enquiries. He made this statement shortly after he was removed from the investigation by Gordon Brown, due to pressure from the McCanns. Why would an innocent parent ask for the removal of the chief investigator who was close to finding their daughter?

Shouldn't Drs McCann and Payne be suspended, until the case is officially resolved, for the safety of your patients? You may argue that you feel your patients are safe with Dr McCann, but his daughter wasn't was she?

Indeed, it was felt that Dr Harold Shipman's patients were safe with him and look what happened there. Then there are other doctors whose patients were not safe - Dr Colin Norris, Nurse Beverley Allitt, etc.

Why is the NHS blatantly allowing such a risk towards their patients? Kate McCann said she was in contact with 6 dead bodies shortly before she went on holiday. That's quite an alarming number of dead bodies, for a GP, given that she only worked one-and-a-half days per week.

Why are these doctors allowed to continue to work within the NHS just because you know the family and choose to disagree with the points I make that are taken from an official police report? It's hardly a very good reason to subject your patients to potential risk and fraud.

I would be grateful for your views because, as a member of the public, I feel I have a right to know what is happening within a public service that I contribute towards with my tax, and your response that you will continue to mislead the public because you know the family is not a good enough answer.

I appreciate that this is an awkward situation for you, but there is no 'arguido' status at the moment and therefore no restriction on freedom of speech about the investigation - but I feel the consequences regarding the risk to your patients and the general public, and the abuse of power surrounding this sinister case, must be addressed.

Saturday

Kate and Gerry McCann have analysed every second of every minute of the day before Madeleine was abducted. If only they had known, there are many things they would have done differently. Sadly, for Kate and Gerry, as time passes, unless Madeleine is found, they will not be able to smile.

We approach the first anniversary of Madeleine’s abduction. Kate and Gerry McCann continue to hope and continue to search. They have now broadened the appeal and are addressing the problems that arise when any child disappears. The Times today has today featured their campaign. When I looked at the article on the internet this morning there were already half a dozen comments, most of them profoundly unsympathetic. One or two were downright offensive. The Times has now removed all the comments.

I do not understand how people can react in this fashion. Kate and Gerry McCanns decision to eat out on that fateful night may have been ill advised. I do not know. I do not have all the facts. I was not there. If they did make a mistake, they will be more aware of that than any commentator, and will relive it every day. I do not believe the Kate and Gerry McCann are bad parents. If they did make a mistake, they are even more deserving of our sympathy.

The chances of finding Madeleine cannot now be good. But should we not be supporting the McCanns rather than forever criticising them?

The only fingerprints that were found were Kate Healy’s. The direction and position of the fingers was pointing to opening it to the left, just as Kate Healy stated: « the window was totally opened to the left», just as well as the nannie from the Ocean Club that went there after the disappearance alarm was given:«the window was partially opened to the left».

There is no doubt that someone opened that window on May the 3rd, but on it only Kate Healy’s fingerprints were found. A detail we didn’t want to reveal or discuss with Stuart.

The presence of Stuart Prior, had by that time a very specific goal, to accompany the questionings of the McCann and, eventually, avoid the imprisonment of the same. His preoccupation on that chapter was evident.

Friday

The interrogations of the McCann and the nervousness of the British police

Stuart’s presence, as the timing for the interrogations to the McCann as arguidos became closer, increased constantly, he appeared anxious and nervous. He wanted to know how everything was going to happen.

We tried to explain how everything would go. One big worry was the rogatory letter that we wished to send to the British authorities.

The first priority was the realization of the cynothecnic exams to the residences of the McCann friends and holiday mates, and on their own, with the aim to examine the clothing and possessions of those persons, in an attempt to locate cadaver scent or human blood. For us these exams should be effectuated by the same cynothecnic team, with the same dogs EVRD and CSI, Eddie and Keela, and for such and with Stuart’s agreement, we send a letter applying for that team. We didn’t know which clothes the McCann had used on the night of May the 3rd.

At the beginning of the investigation we had solicited every photograph and film of that and the previous days, but they only supplied us daylight photographs; it’s as if the at night and on the famous Tapas dinners they never took any pictures, although some of the guests had their photo machines. This lack of night pics was something we never digested very well. With reference to the rogatory letter, we wanted to search and apprehend photos and film/videos of the holiday nights at the Ocean Club. At the McCann’s home we wanted to verify the existence of a board that pointed to the existence Maddie’s problems with sleeping. This had been mentioned by Kate and, according to the mother, had been used until April 2006, the time at which Madeleine started to sleep regularly during the night without interruptions. We wanted to apprehend the original of the diary that Kate Healy started writing from the May 3rd onwards.

It was our intention to re-interview the whole group of friends due to the inconstancies about their children’s surveillance scheme during the dinner periods at the Ocean Club. We wanted answers to our request formulated to the British authorities on the first day of our investigation, through the liaison officer, in Portugal, about the McCann family and their friends. Since, as incredible as it may seem, we hadn’t received any answer at that time to our insistent requests [note o.T.: late August], we were going to indicate these diligences through the rogatory letter. We questioned Stuart about that. He responded that “they were gathering elements about the couple and their friends”, and they had already sent a first answer. This one was related to the social economic situation and on it, strangely the British police stated that it was not known that the McCann possessed any credit cards.

Fraud or abuse of confidence?

In a relaxing moment of one of these reunions I may have committed a slip or, maybe, I was a little inopportune or less diplomatic. Worried with the possibility that the McCann were, in any way, involved in the disappearance of their child, and while I reasoned about the sort of crimes in which the same could be involved, I concluded a fact.

If, really, it became confirmed any sort of responsibility on the part of the McCann, then it would put in cause the existence of the Fund created for searching for Madeleine, which was up to 2 million pounds, a crime of fraud and confidence abuse. A debate opened up, and in fact, with the forwarded premises, this crime of fraud and abuse of confidence could exist, but Portugal wouldn’t have jurisdiction to investigate and trial such a case. This belonged to the United Kingdom, because the Fund was registered in that country. Then the British partners became aware of a tough reality: a strong possibility that they had a crime to investigate in their country, having as eventual suspects the McCann couple, a thing that didn’t seem to please them very much. Just got aware of a sudden paleness on the faces of the british present.

This is the transcript of an interview with Gonçalo Amaral, Paulo Reis and Duarte Levy, by Júlia Pinheiro, on 'As Tardes da Júlia', TVI, broadcast live on or around the 28th of July 2008.

Júlia Pinheiro (JP): The Attorney General’s Office has archived the process, but everything indicates that a new stage of the Maddie case is about to begin. Gonçalo Amaral, the PJ’s former coordinator has launched this book (Maddie – The Truth about the Lie) which is already here and also in my hand, where he numbers some surprising facts. He is going to be my guest today, he has not arrived yet but he will soon be here, and as these things work best with more than one accomplice, I have two journalists present to talk with me and to interrogate and talk a bit with Gonçalo Amaral. These are also two well known faces, who have been following the Maddie case in a committed and involved manner, please welcome Duarte Levy and Paulo Reis.

(applause)

JP: Hello good afternoon! Now tell me, you have obviously read the book already.

Paulo Reis (PR): Yes.

Duarte Levy (DL): Yes.

JP: Right away, right away.

PR: On the day before.

DL: Right on the day before.

JP: Right on the day before. So while we wait for Gonçalo Amaral, and we’re talking in his back, afterwards we will talk in front of him, what did you think? Duarte?

DL: There are still things that remain unsaid. I think that this book already opens a path, it already shows, clarifies a lot of things, many doubts that existed concerning the case, but I think that former inspector Gonçalo Amaral probably has a lot more to say.

JP: So there is a certain feeling that there could be more. Is that it?

DL: There could be more. I think that sooner or later he will do it. The book should maybe be read twice, because there is a lot between the lines but it’s a book that I strongly advise people to read.

JP: Paulo?

PR: Just one detail. We read the book on the day before like so many other journalists, because the editor offered copies to the journalists that requested them on the eve of the publication. I make a very simple initial analysis that is the following. I presume that what is in the book is what is in the process. Dr Gonçalo Amaral would not make things up and include things that are not in the process. And after reading the book, I remembered the PJ’s final report which led to the archiving. I went to re-read and compare both.

JP: And what about that comparison?

PR: The perception that I have is that there are two perspectives, the perspective with which the PJ looks at the process’ contents, in the light of what is contained in Gonçalo Amaral’s book, it gives me the idea that the PJ’s report focuses on what was not discovered.While the book contains what was discovered and what was not discovered. This would be almost like looking at a glass of water that is filled up to half, and saying it is half full or half empty. But I think that the PJ’s report says that the glass is half empty, and Dr Gonçalo Amaral’s book says that the glass is two thirds full.

JP: And we are desperate to read the whole liquid, to drink the whole liquid, aren’t we? Gonçalo Amaral could not endure us speaking about him in his back and he is already here. A round of applause for Gonçalo Amaral. Please come in…

(applause)

JP: Good afternoon! How are you?

GA: Good afternoon.

JP: Please be seated.

GA: Here?

JP: Yes, here. I finally get to meet the man who everyone is talking about and I can’t resist the first question:Are you apprehensive about the McCann couple’s threats?

GA: No. The book is based on facts and like someone told me it was written honestly, therefore it does not contain falsehoods and I’m not apprehensive.

JP: Why do you think that they went as far as making sure that it reached Portugal, especially that sentence: “He should be very careful” the McCann couple said two days before the book was published?

GA: I didn’t hear the McCann couple say that. I heard a person who says he is a spokesman. Therefore it is not a status within the process, I think he is even a witness in the process at the moment, so that gentleman should know what he is saying.

JP: You don’t give it anything more, another value…

GA: I have already thought about what I should do regarding that gentleman, but I’m keeping it to myself, therefore…

JP: With Clarence Mitchell?

GA: Exactly.

JP: It is curious that he is one of the persons that are not mentioned in the book.

GA: Yes because the book is about a criminal investigation of which that gentleman is not part. There may be an area, which is the journalistic area to understand the political pressure, but maybe a journalist could write about that area, even concerning the role of the media, the book doesn’t focus much on that.

JP: Yes but it also covers it.

GA: It mentions facts, a set of facts, diligences, testimonies and scientific and documental evidence that is featured in the process. Therefore that gentleman is not part of the investigation despite all the noise that he has produced in the investigation.

JP: Indeed and you report his entry into the process. There are so many questions that have not been clarified to this day

GA: The investigation does not have to worry about that gentleman, does it?

JP: Duarte Levy and Paulo, who will ask questions just like me, were saying that they were left with the feeling, may I call you Gonçalo?

GA: Yes.

JP: That’s settled, then. They were left with the feeling that you leave a lot out of the book. And that the book does not contain everything.

GA: Something has to be left out.

JP: Why?

GA: I’m a trained jurist, I’m a jurist, and we don’t say everything, do we. It may be for a second edition of the book, it may be for certain explanations that someone wishes, therefore… it’s my own secret.

JP: It’s your own secret. So there is a secret? You haven’t told everything?

GA: No, but it’s details, anyway.

JP: But I get the feeling, precisely in this book, you two can join the conversation if you wish (to DL and PR), that in this book the details are very important, in fact, it’s in the details that for people like us who follow things attentively, that this book becomes surprising. I’m going to let Paulo launch…

PR: A very precise, very direct question for Dr Gonçalo Amaral. Do you think that the PJ’s final report, which was widely reported by the media and even was published online by Expresso newspaper. Do you think that the report faithfully reflects, does it make an accurate balance of the investigation?

GA: Well before anything else, I want to thank you for the work that you have done since that time, the manner how you have followed the investigation and the way that you have been solidary with truth and justice.

PR: That is my obligation as a journalist.

GA: You may not have done more than your obligation but I want to thank you and to thank all the journalists. Concerning that report, I have to be sincere, I haven’t read it yet. I haven’t had time to read it but if it is a report that led to the archiving, it cannot be faithful towards what exists in the process, so it’s an imposition, I would not like to comment much further on that, but it’s the position of police professionals who took it, that decision to write that report that was being very well written…

JP: Weren’t you curious to read that report? That final report from the PJ?

GA: No, no. I haven’t had time, either. I haven’t had any time at all to read it. This has been a bumpy ride…

JP: I find that absolutely impossible, I don’t believe it. Have you cut all bonds with what you left behind? Have you distanced yourself emotionally from all of this?

GA: No. I haven’t cut all bonds. No.

JP: I don’t believe it!

GA: But sincerely I haven’t read the report yet. I haven’t read the report, I know it’s on the internet, so I will read it but I haven’t read it yet.

JP: I’m not convinced at all but say it.

GA: But I’m telling you the truth.

JP: Yes, Duarte?

DL: There is a question. We heard, a short while ago, about the existence of an investigation into your private life, yours, inspector Tavares de Almeida’s private life and even Guilhermino de Encarnação’s private life. Carried out by private detectives that are connected to the McCann family. And in the book, at some point you mention your dog. What happened to that dog? This is a question.

GA: A mere coincidence, at the beginning of the investigation, the dog died. Surely nobody went there and killed him, it could have been other dogs, right.

DL: But during this investigation, did you never feel that maybe there was a pressure on you, on your colleagues…

GA: The pressure was the persecution that we were subject to, but it was not much of a persecution anyway, because they didn’t find out where I lived, they didn’t find out outside of Portimão and not inside either, which was 100 metres from the police building that we all lived, they just followed me during those 100 metres from the police building and from the restaurant where I had lunch, so that big investigation that was done, by those journalists from English tabloids, they only managed to check 100 metres, because in fact nothing more apart from that. Concerning those gentlemen’s investigation, it’s the first time that I hear about that, I’m not worried. I only hope that if it is true, I hope that the entities that have responsibilities in criminal terms in this country act, because in fact it has been too much time. There is a very serious interference that started after I left Portimão, to try to carry out investigations, not only in this case but also related to the Joana case. And I think that -

JP: In order to discredit you, to ruin your credibility, is that it?

GA: Me and the Polícia Judiciária. I mean, they tried to question both investigations, there are things that, people came up and told me that this is for the little girls, for Joana and for Madeleine. Therefore, and they want to obtain information and things, therefore. In Portugal, criminal investigation it’s well defined in the law who can carry it out, those gentlemen cannot do it and what they do here in Portugal has to be sanctioned somehow.

JP: Obviously. Before I let Paulo speak, I would like to ask a question which I don’t know whether Gonçalo will answer, but as you are not an inspector anymore and are now out of the circuit and haven’t even read…

GA: I was never an inspector. I was a coordinator… it’s a matter of…

JP: Coordinator, I apologize, but as you are not with the PJ anymore, maybe you can, we have already talked more about states of the soul, about impressions. You started shaking your head as a no, but anyway. The first contact that you had with the McCann family, father and mother, what did you think?

GA: Well, I don’t speak English, therefore the contact was made through other persons, but I had no reaction.

JP: But did you think that you were in the presence of a genuinely worried couple, desperate to find their daughter?

GA: I didn’t make that type of judgment. In a criminal investigation, we have to base ourselves in facts, we have to be objective and leave emotions behind. The parents’ situation of anguish is logical, there was anguish, now whether it was anguish over the disappearance of their daughter or over knowing that their daughter was dead, it’s different and it cannot be distinguished like that. But in fact there was anguish contrary to what is being said, not in the police building but it’s known that the little girl’s mother cried she apparently cried that morning, so that anguish could be over the loss of her daughter, right? Therefore if they are committed to searching, it’s not normal that on the first day, the first hour, the only possible lead was abduction, abduction and it’s extended into saying abduction by Portuguese paedophile networks, therefore, these conclusions are made too soon after the event, because several possibilities were open at that moment, therefore, from then onwards I also find that strange and we took it into consideration.

JP: And later on? When you continue the investigation, you cross ways with this couple several times, did your opinion change or do you think that…

GA: The idea that I got and that my colleagues got, things have to be put in their place, don’t they, I was the coordinator of an investigation team, which included English, Portuguese, joint national directors, vice directors, this was the operational part that was being directed from Portimão, where the investigation was based. The advance that happens, is relatively changed. There is a sort of flight forward, we can understand that, it happens and possibly not only in this case, but in other cases where people sort of, I don’t want to say lie, half truth, they stick to the idea that there is an abduction and they don’t think about anything except abduction and psychologists and psychiatrists have already mentioned that, so it’s as if they believed it was true, there is this flight forward, therefore, from that moment onwards they continue to say that they search for their daughter.

JP: But did they change their behaviour, or did they have a more cold, more reserved attitude, more contained or more emotional…

GA: There are situations that are reported in the book but there are others when there isn’t a normal behaviour, so the person despairs during a moment of anxiety and we actually try to understand, we try, if it’s an obstruction that was the issue there, if it was really a demand for ransom, and we try to negotiate with that individual who was in Holland.

JP: That episode is particularly surprising.

GA: And then we watch that, us Portuguese who were there...

JP: ... and the English...

GA: ... and the English, we watched it in stupefaction, he was sitting there with a lollipop laughing on the phone and we were all waiting...

JP: We’re talking about Gerry McCann, at the moment when, because someone did try a coup like that, correct? So while you were waiting for him to make contact with you…

GA: … maybe it was his way of reacting to that tension, maybe it’s justifiable but to us, we were shocked, it’s not. We were searching for his daughter, doing our job.

JP: While he visited sites on the internet...

GA: No, he was on the phone.

JP: Ah he was on the phone and sucking on a lollipop wasn’t it and laughing and chatting?

GA: Yes! Completely detached from what was going on and about to happen…

JP: So that shocked you in particular?

GA: Me and the colleagues who were present.

JP: Very well. Paulo wanted to ask a question. Let’s hear it –

PR: A very specific question that stands out in your book. There are 7 witnesses, 4 friends of the McCanns, 2 English tourists that were there at the Ocean Club, and one of the nannies from the crèche who guarantee that they saw Robert Murat near the apartment on the evening that Madeleine disappeared. Robert Murat denies this, he says that he was with his mother, and then the Judiciária questions several members of the GNR, of the staff from the Ocean Club, and people who live there and who participated in the searches and who know Robert Murat perfectly because he lives there and all of those people deny those witnesses and peremptorily state that they did not see Robert Murat that night. This is the question that I ask you. Isn’t it obligatory even from a legal standpoint, faced with what to me seem like false statements, that certificates are extracted and that there are legal procedures against those witnesses because they are giving a false statement?

GA: Provided that the Public Ministry proves that they are really false statements.

PR: I’m aware it’s a decision for the Public Ministry, I only –

GA: I think they are. As a jurist, I think they are, I have that notion that they in fact don’t give a truthful testimony.

PR: But there is no news that those persons were targeted by a process from the Public Ministry.

GA: In fact there is another situation with Mathew Oldfield who says he went inside the apartment and states that he saw two windows, and his wife says that moments before that, minutes earlier, he had listened at the two bedroom windows, so that detail of the two windows, which seems to be a mistake but it’s not quite so, therefore, if they had been in the bedroom they would know that there was only one window in the bedroom, even outside of the bedroom if they had been listening it would only be one window as well, therefore there is only one window.

PR: So it is not known that the Public Ministry acted on the matter of the false testimonies by those witnesses, which in fact, Robert Murat’s lawyer has already announced that as soon as he has access to the process –

GA: Yes because there even was a confrontation between them…

PR: Yes precisely, precisely.

JP: So for now there are no consequences?

GA: Well, it seems not.

JP: It seems not. I insist on the questions concerning your impressions because it was maybe the aspect of the book that I was most avid to know whether or not you would take that route, and twice or thrice you let the text slide towards it, and I was really very surprised over that behaviour from Gerry McCann at the moment when the possibility of his daughter’s ransom is being discussed, which was obviously fictitious, but his behaviour relating to it and some observations that you make concerning Kate McCann. Namely a certain irritation and ill humour under several circumstances. Can you define who is Kate McCann?

GA: It is difficult to define, isn’t it. She almost cried in front of us, and then she lowered her head and when she returned she came back more aggressive, more –

JP: But within the couple she is the more combative, the more controlling person.

GA: I didn’t want to take that route in terms of rendering things subjective but…

JP: I noticed that.

GA: … but that is how it was. It was a bit, there was something not right there, but maybe a psychiatrist or someone could analyze the behaviour.

JP: Very well, you don’t want to say much about your personal impressions of her ahaha

GA: The issue here is not… I don’t have to worry about the McCann couple. What I have to worry about, or had to worry about is that little girl and find out what happened to her. It’s logical that knowing who the parents are and their behaviour, how they react, all of that is important within an investigation. But the most important thing is for us to integrate with what we have, to find the facts and to follow a route in terms of the final objective. Therefore, discussing the parents… it’s a question…

JP: But surely the second route that was chosen was the possibility that they are involved in her disappearance it had to do with that behaviour that we just referred… some coldness, some…

GA: No…

JP: It wasn’t only about that?

GA: It was about the entire investigation that is made isn’t it, but…

JP: And these elements aren’t analysed?

GA: We don’t base ourselves on empathies and we don’t like or dislike persons, we focus on the investigations.

JP: I’m not talking about empathies; I’m talking about behavioural observation. That is also analysed.

GA: It is, but –

JP: Ah!

GA: But what leads us into the direction of the little girl’s death is facts, not only looking at people and thinking that…

JP: Do you really reach the theory of an accidental death according to your theory, before the dogs arrive in Portugal, or…

GA: Yes, before the dogs come to Portugal, there are signs of death as I say in the book, signs which are given by the family that a cadaver is being searched. This gentleman comes from South Africa, and hair from the little girl, supposedly from the little girl, he places it inside a machine which he invented and we hear its contents which says that there within a certain area of the beach lies a cadaver. So he came on the couple’s request, otherwise he would not be requested. Then, the dogs’ intervention follows a work of analysis, of planning carried out by a British national consultant, from the British police, he was here in Portugal, he saw the area, he consulted the process with what happened, therefore with facts that existed, he went to the area, he rode a helicopter, consulted with academics, and all that and he reached the conclusion that we have to search for a cadaver. In order to search for a cadaver these experts have to be used, these dogs and that was what happened. So from there on…

JP: So that was what is called a good relationship between British and Portuguese investigators.

GA: Very good.

JP: Very good. Contrary to everything that was later reported by the press.

GA: Exactly.

JP: So your opinion is that an accidental death took place in that apartment.

GA: It is not my opinion. It’s the opinion of the investigation. This has to be made very clear. I have repeated this several times but it’s important.

JP: You are absolutely right, so according to the investigation…

GA: According to the investigation that was composed of English, Portuguese investigators…

JP: Exactly. The little girl died in that apartment?

GA: The little girl died in that apartment.

JP: On the evening of the 3rd of May.

GA: And we reached that conclusion with the data that we have.

JP: And before the time that was announced? Before 10 pm which is the time that was…

GA: The time is not known because the reconstitution was not carried out, which could be important in order to define the times and to verify if they could have attended all that vigilance from the parents, every 10 or every 5 minutes, so if they were having dinner and all of a sudden almost nobody dined, isn’t it. But it seems that only one plate went back, a steak that had to be warmed up. It was necessary to understand who it was that failed to eat that steak and what everyone else ate, how long the dinner lasted, how long the meals take to be confectioned, and all of those things in order to understand it all afterwards.The reconstitution was not carried out and from there on it’s difficult to know at what time it could have happened. There is one piece of data in terms of accurate time that evening, it exists and it concerns the little girl, it’s the time at which she left the nursery.

JP: At 5.30 pm.

GA: At 5.30 pm, concerning the other witnesses that were at the beach there is the video registry, they were filmed by the camera that was there, at 6.36 pm they leave the beach, first the men and afterwards the women and children, in terms of times and then there is the time of the Irish witness who knows at what time his dinner ends, and he has the receipt of the payment with the time at which he paid, when he leaves the restaurant across the street –

JP: Across the street he sees a man walking down with a child…

GA: He sees a man walking down with a child.

JP: … who he only realizes to be Gerry McCann when he sees Gerry McCann descending with his children…

GA: Exactly.

JP: … when they return to England.

GA: The files that mention the testimony, they mention the clumsy manner in which he carried the child, the posture which we could call athletic, that he was an athletic individual and they offer a description, they reach the point of saying that, it was maybe possible in terms of saying who it is physically, but with those characteristics, the manner in which he walked, how he carried the child, they could know who it was. And so when he sees, when that family sees Gerry McCann descending from the airplane carrying the child and he starts to walk on the pavement, they realized. Now he says it’s 80%, if you tell me ah that is not evidence, I also agree it’s not evidence but at least it’s a piece of information and that information should always be worked out.

JP: And was it?

GA: When I left Portimão, on the 1st of October, I left on the 2nd but on the 1st we were arranging for those witnesses to come to Portugal. We already had permission from the national director, all that was left to do was to choose a hotel for them to stay and to schedule a date. After I left I know it took several months until the witness was heard, which happened around January or February this year, I don’t know, through a rogatory letter or a request for assistance under international cooperation.

JP: That is really one of the surprising bits of data. Another piece of data which is also surprising is related to that towel that Kate McCann gives for the first dogs, our dogs, the Portuguese. Why did she give a towel and not a piece of clothing? After this I’ll let Paulo speak.

GA: That is another question that has to be understood as well, doesn’t it? The towel because supposedly she had had a bath that day, right? It would therefore carry more of the little girl’s smell, the little girl’s odour, so this was an option between her, I think, and the members of GNR.

JP: The GNR which was there. Let’s hear Paulo.

PR: Now before I move on to another question, concerning the towel has the PJ established for example how often the bed sheets and the towels in the apartments are changed. Because if memory doesn’t fail me, the towel is delivered to the GNR 48 hours after the little girl disappeared.

GA: No. The towel was handed over right on that night.

PR: On that night.

GA: The GNR dogs also arrived that night. But the last time that the apartment had been cleaned was on Wednesday.

PR: A while ago, you mentioned an English policeman, a great expert, I suppose you were referring to Mark Harrison who is one of the two or three best British policemen in terms of investigating complex crimes. He was here, he spent a week in Praia da Luz, he rummaged through Praia da Luz, he walked everywhere, the saw the process upside down, he read the entire process, and then he wrote a report in which he concludes that the most likely hypothesis is the child’s death, and if I’m correct, he proposes the dogs’ coming, right?

GA: Exactly.

PR: Was he the policeman who also retired, a reference that you made during a press conference? That there was an English policeman who retired.

GA: No.

PR: Was there an English policeman who also retired?

GA: The English policeman who retired is from the Leicester police. Now the reasons I would prefer not to talk about him at the moment. As a matter of fact I’d like to talk to him personally and I don’t want him to be pressured so I would reserve myself the right not to comment any further.

PR: Just to make this very clear, is that English policeman, Mark Harrison…

GA: No, no, no.

PR: … who comes here, writes a report, no, I’m not talking about the retirement issue, I’m just saying that he came here, that he is an expert in complex crime, one of the most prestigious from the English police, he walks the streets of Praia da Luz from one end to another, he measures, routes, timings, he analyses the process and after that he writes a report in his quality as one of the finest English experts, where he writes black on white that the most likely possibility is that the child died in the apartment, is that correct?

GA: Correct.

PR: That is what marks the turn in the investigations.

GA: Correct.

PR: And then the famous dogs arrive…

GA: Yes, to detect cadaver and human blood odour.

JP: So you don’t want to tell why your colleague retired. He has his own reasons. But you are aware that all of this thickens the public’s perception of a Machiavellian conspiracy theory. I understand your position, maybe at the moment you don’t want to say more or you can’t, it’s a fact that your book has brought us something more but we still fail to understand everything. Mainly, possibly the macro-structure that surrounds all of this. Duarte?

DL: No, I just wanted to talk about the issue of the English lab’s reports.

JP: That is very important, yes.

GA: The reports from the English labs… the English reports arrive shortly before the questionings that were scheduled. And it contained certain conclusions, if they thought they were inconclusive they shouldn’t have mentioned it, the question of the 15 alleles in a profile of 19 from the little girl, stating that they match Madeleine McCann, but they also say that it could have been a construction let’s say from various donors, from other persons, a contamination could have produced Madeleine McCann’s profile by coincidence. But there are no excuses for saying that it is not from Madeleine McCann because they held the profiles of the father, the mother, the siblings, therefore there are no doubts that at least within that family they only matched Madeleine McCann’s.

DL: In Portugal, for example, we only need a match of 15 alleles out of 19 in order to determine someone’s paternity, therefore… That is the first fact. The second fact is that at this moment, the institute for Forensic Medicine is already prepared, they already own the same equipment as the FSS in England to carry out this type of analysis. Why does the Public Ministry or the Polícia Judiciária not request, or don’t they have any more samples to carry out…

GA: As far as we know, they have all been destroyed by now, namely the hair. Nothing can be done.

PR: Concerning the FSS reports –

GA: And the samples were microscopic, weren’t they…

PR: Are you absolutely certain that the reports that reached you, namely those concerning the blood residues in the car boot, are exactly the reports that left the FSS?

GA: I have no doubts whatsoever, in fact, they were delivered by a senior official from Leicester police, it carries a logo, they came and went by email, so there is an existing origin, therefore the report is signed, so I have no doubts about that.

JP: You have no doubts whatsoever about that.

GA: On the official document.

JP: But wasn’t it published in Belgium that…

DL: … that there are two reports. There is one report that left the FSS and there is a second slightly different report that arrived in Portugal.

GA: There is a recent report and there are two other reports. The first one mentions 15 alleles and here is the main question, it places the focus, they place the focus on that part of the exam from the vehicle, in the second [report] they then focus on the apartment, if on one side 15 alleles were not enough, in the other there were only 5 alleles that matched Madeleine McCann’s genetic profile, what could be read there was that there were almost no problems. Because it’s easily justifiable. It may not be justifiable with the cadaver odour on the spot where the blood sample was collected, but therefore, inside the house it is easy to justify, it’s more difficult with a car that was rented more than twenty days later. So this is where the major confusion lies.

JP: Yes, Paulo?

PR: At a given moment in time, around the 9th or 10th of May, starts what you mention in your book, a wave of sightings of Madeleine. Madeleine is first seen in Morocco, by a…

GA: First she is seen here in Portugal. The wave starts to spread in Portugal.

PR: Exactly. Portugal and then –

GA: Then she is seen in the North, then jumps to South America, Brazil…

PR: One that was largely publicised by the English newspapers, was from a Norwegian lady who was spending holidays in Morocco and who swears that she saw the little girl. What the English press does not mention at that time is that the lady is Norwegian but she is married to a man who was born and bred in Rothley, the town where the…

JP: It could be a tremendous coincidence.

PR: … the McCanns resided for the last few years. This is the question that I ask you: The wave of sightings, namely in Morocco, where witnesses state that they are 100% certain that it was the child, I have no doubts. Beyond the usual confirmation with Interpol, Interpol and the police forces in those countries were requested to investigate those sightings and those witnesses.

GA: The witnesses, it was necessary to hear those witnesses and she lives in Southern Spain. She lives near Valencia. That is one of the diligences that possibly remained to carry out. But concerning those sightings in Morocco, it was through the cooperation with the English police, with liaison officers with the Moroccan police that tried to obtain the video tapes from that petrol station where the little girl was seen, in order to try to find out if it could actually be her or not. It was all handled from there.

JP: And you don’t value the fact that really the lady who saw is married to someone who coincidentally is…

GA: That was actually taken into account and it happened later, as Paulo Reis said, and as a matter of fact it’s something that should have been worked upon in terms of being heard.

JP: Well, let’s talk about what worries…

GA: But I can also say that apart from those sightings all over the world, in Praia da Luz there were little girls that strongly resembled Madeleine, blond with blue eyes, many of the same age as her. Therefore, someone could have spotted Madeleine there, in Praia da Luz, something that was not done.

JP: That’s true, that’s true. In your opinion, Maddie, in the opinion of the investigation and of your colleagues and the team that you coordinated, did Maddie die that evening?

GA: She died.

JP: And someone took her from that apartment and placed her where?

GA: Look, when we are in an investigation of this kind we have to understand what the knowledge of those persons is, if they know other people, what contacts they have. If they have means at their disposal. We have to know the area itself, to know about the facility or the almost material impossibility to conceal the corpse within few hours and few minutes. And the conclusion that we reach with all of this, with all of this data is that, if there was any involvement from those nine persons, the corpse could only be in the beach area. And that is in fact where the gentleman…

JP: The investigator.

GA: Not the investigator, the Irish witnesses…

JP: Ah yes!

GA: … see a person passing, a man carrying a child, a little girl, they say that it is in effect Madeleine going towards the South area, let’s put it that way, towards the sea side. Now whether or not she stayed there, that is another question. For how long she stayed there, what happens next, only the development of the investigation of that area of death, let’s put it that way, could take us there.

JP: Would you have followed that investigation line?

GA: It was the direction that I was following at that time so until we emptied it we weren’t stopping, were we…

JP: It sounds so unbelievable, the possibility that a body was placed on a cliff, or in any other area on the beach, and then removed and transported in a rental car.

GA: The corpse couldn’t have remained there all the time. It’s impossible.

JP: So where was it taken next?

GA: If we take into account that, if we consider the traces that were found in the car boot…

JP: … which are in fact…

GA: … which are in fact from the little girl. In order to justify that bodily fluid as the lab says, it could only have been preserved and conserved in the cold because otherwise it would have been…

JP: That means that…

GA: … in an advanced state of decomposition, at least it’s a hypothesis. Therefore it’s a question of a deep freezer, or something similar, and there we had to search for it and that was what we were doing. This means, the contacts that they had, where they went, where they were seen… There are people who say that they were seen entering an apartment block near the cemetery in Praia da Luz. At that point in time we weren’t able to detect which apartment they entered, who lived there, because it’s also a bit complicated because you have to understand it’s a tourist area and often it’s not known who the apartment belongs to.

JP: Of course, of course…

GA: Who lives there, for how long they live there, so all of that was being worked upon. To try to understand the support…

JP: If someone discovered a deep freezer in the area and…

GA: If it was actually a deep freezer, it doesn’t exist anymore now.

JP: Is that still possible to find out? I imagine…

GA: Look, a few years ago on the Azores, after a homicide that had taken place years earlier, we managed to locate a vehicle that was already in a junk yard in which a taxi driver had been killed, a taxi driver from Praia da Vitória in the Azores. But we were unlucky, normally the van’s back had a carpet but it didn’t exist anymore. That carpet didn’t exist anymore, so if we had found that carpet it would have been possible to prove that the death had taken place there, so anything is possible.

JP: Anything is possible. I don’t know if Paulo and Duarte have any further questions, you have to be brief, we’re almost finishing.

DL: One more doubt, I read in your book that you never received the medical report, Madeleine’s clinical history. For example I also know that –

GA: We think, because that’s the way it is, we spoke to the English police, they said right away that there were problems in England to hand that over within the rogatory letter’s context. There is a rogatory letter that was carried out but before that there was another rogatory letter that was being prepared which also contained those questions and which also contained questions about other tests, other tests by the dogs with the friends that were there, namely on the clothes with those same dogs in order to try to find cadaver odour or any other trace, that was important. So there was that rogatory letter…

DL: And you never received those reports, you receive the reply that the McCanns had no credit cards, you already knew that was false, could it then be said that there were two English teams working on this case? The one that in fact stood beside the PJ and the one that worked against…

GA: I don’t speak with the English police, I can assure you…

JP: And now we don’t speak at all because we’re arriving at the end. I only want, Gonçalo Amaral, I only want to know one thing. Will Maddie return to your life one of these days, or not?

GA: I think yes. This book has the will of clarifying and of contributing to the investigation, I think yes, there are more things to talk about.

JP: Is that your mission?

GA: It’s not a mission, it’s a question of recovering my dignity and my honour and that of my colleagues and of this institution to which I was so proud of belonging to for so many years, and of justice being done for the little girl.

JP: Thank you. A round of applause for Gonçalo Amaral. Duarte Levy and Paulo Reis, thank you very much.

1. In the Ocean Club Apartmenta) cadaver odour was detected by the English dogs behind a couch in the living room, close to a window that leads to the apartments back area

b) blood (a very small amount) on that windows curtains; the curtains and the wall were washed

c) collected fingerprints belong only to the couple and their friends; there are no fingerprints from Robert Murat, the cases first arguido

d) searches with dogs in the other apartments of the same block at the resort did not yield these results, only the McCanns

The cadaver odour that was detected by the dogs indicates that the parents were with Madeleine after her death, and therefore must know what happened. This because, as they say, they were in the apartment until dinner time, at 8.30 p.m. It takes at least two hours for a corpse to release odours that can be detected by the dogs

2. In the Renault Scenic car (rented by the McCanns on May 27)

a) cadaver odour was detected by the dogs

b) a very reduced sample of human fluid, in the car boot. After being analysed in Birmingham, this fluid registered, according to the PJs director, Alipio Ribeiro, results that do not allow a 100% correspondence with Maddies genetic profile

c) hair that is compatible with Maddies genetic profile; there is doubt about whether they landed there by “transference"

3. In the Vista Mar villa (rented by the McCanns)

a) cadaver odour, detected by the dogs on clothes that belong to Kate, and on the pink soft toy

b) an English book, normally used by police, that focuses on the different types of crimes, as well as on what clues should be looked for to identify its perpetrators

c) a bible, on Kates bedside table, open at the Old Testament, at the passage that tells the death of King Davids son (God punished David with the death of his son, in order to force him away from sin and to return onto the path of good)

d) Kates diary, in which she writes about daily difficulties, in dealing with her children

4. Contradictions between the couples statements and those of their friends

a) Gerry says during dinner he got up to check on his children; restaurant staff says only two people from the group left the dinner table and those were RussellO'Brien and Matthew Oldfield

b) Russell arrived late for dinner and left at some point: he said his daughter had vomited and he was waiting for someone to change the bedsheets; the hotel staff say nobody requested clean bedsheets

c) Jane, Russells wife, says she saw a man passing on the resorts street, carrying a child. An Irishman, who was at the same time in the same spot, says he saw nobody pass.

On that date, inspections were conducted in the apartments occupied by members of the McCann family as well as the group who were with them at the time of Madeleine McCann's disappearance. It was only on that date that the apartment, identified as that of the parents, was empty allowing further investigation which was authorised by the respective occupants. Thus, at the appointed time, the search with the dogs began, covering the following apartments:

5A:

From 8.30pm to 9.20pm, the dogs go through.8.20pm: The cadaver dog, "marks," the couple's wardrobe area in the bedroom.8.22pm: The cadaver dog, "marks" an area behind the sofa in the sitting room near the window overlooking the road.From 8.47pm to 9.20pm, the blood detecting dog goes through.8.10 (should it be 9.10?) The dog, "marks" an area of floor behind the sofa in the sitting room, near the window overlooking the road.

5B: 9.24 to 9.27pm: The cadaver dog did not alert on anything.

5D: 9.29 to 9.34pm: The cadaver dog did not alert on anything.

5H : 9.35 to 9.38pm : The cadaver dog did not alert on anything.

4G : 9.42 to 9.45pm : The cadaver dog did not alert on anything.

Garden belonging to apartment 5A (with access via the balcony and the steps):

9.49 to 10pm: The cadaver dog "marks" an area of the garden immediately below the window.-----

Quote.DNA tests on all five blood drops and on three bloodstains found on the rear gate at the crime scene showed that all of this blood belonged to Simpson. Two DNA tests were used, PCR [ polymerase chain reaction] and RFLP, [restrictive fragment length polymorphism].The PCR test is less precise than the RFLP, but can be conducted on much smaller blood samples, as well as samples that have that have degenerated or degraded because of bacteria and/ or exposure to the elements.PCR tests were conducted on four out of the five blood drops. Three showed that only one out of 240,000 people had DNA with the markers found in the sample.The fourth blood drop had markers which one of 5,200 people could have. Simpson was one of these people.The fifth blood drop had sufficient markers for an RFLP test, and showed only one out of 170 million people had DNA with those markers. Again Simpson's blood did.The richest sample showed that only one out of 57 billion people had those markers. Again Simpson's blood did.In other words, just on the blood evidence alone, there's only a one out of 57 billion chance that Simpson is innocent.Fifty seven billion is approximately ten times the current population of the entire world.

.................................................

Short extract from the book 'Outrage, the five reasons why OJ Simpson got away with murder.'By Vincent Bugliosi

Tuesday

Last week I revealed that the News of the World was in trouble for publishing Kate McCann's diaries without her permission. Yesterday the paper duly apologised for having done so, causing yet more grief to a grief-stricken woman.

But it was a mealy-mouthed apology, carried on page 2 (the original article having been on page 1 and two full inside pages). You can read the "apology" in full here, but note the weasel words:

"We published the extracts in the belief held in good faith that we had Kate's permission to do so. It is now clear that our belief was misplaced, and that in fact Kate neither approved of nor knew that the extracts were to be published."

This is a breathtaking excuse for having screwed up. I understand that the paper had not sought a written agreement, had not spoken to Mrs McCann and had no clear-cut verbal agreement. So let's call "good faith" blind faith. There is no way that the paper would have apologised (and donated money to the Find Madeleine campaign) unless it knew that it had done wrong.

Note also these unctuous sentences:

"Upon learning of our error we immediately removed the extracts from our website and we today offer Kate our immediate and sincere apologies...

"The News of the World remains wholly supportive of the McCanns and their continuing campaign to find their daughter."

It removed the website articles after lawyers intervened. As for being "wholly supportive", it was so supportive it was happy enough to run copyrighted material without permission. It was wholly supportive by intruding further into the privacy of a mother grieving the loss of her vanished four-year-old daughter. It was wholly supportive by feigning sympathy for the McCann family while trying to win sales through a tawdry "exclusive".

But why am I alone in condemning the journalism - the so-called journalism - of the News of the World? The BBC and Sky News did see fit to mention the apology on their bulletins, and carry the story of their websites, here and here. But the paper's scandalous behaviour was ignored by the press. Why should that be?

I think national paper editors tend to believe the News of the World inhabits some kind of parallel universe. It is so far below the salt that it doesn't matter. Better to ignore it altogether.

In fact, as Britain's largest-selling title, it should be monitored carefully and its continual breaches of journalistic ethics - not to mention breaches of the editors' code of practice - should be exposed. They contribute mightily to the widespread public distaste for the press.

And lest we forget, this is not some isolated error. The paper's editor, Colin "Calamity" Myler, was previously fired from an editorship (of the Sunday Mirror) for poor journalistic judgment. He was also responsible for the sleazy journalism that led to a privacy victory by Max Mosley over the News of the World. And this is the man who has broken a pledge made in November last year to change the NoW's agenda.

He told fellow editors at the time that his paper would run fewer sex and drugs celebrity stings. He told them: "I personally believe that stories about celebrities misbehaving - well, that's a surprise, isn't it?" Instead, he promised that the paper would look more often at "other issues... that affect the fabric of society."

This week's "other issues" affecting society's fabric were a collection of soft porn revelations about a footballer's alleged girlfriend being an alleged hooker (plus titillating video), an actress's alleged desire for a lesbian fling (plus slideshow and video) and an "online exclusive" about the alleged "sex secrets" of a Strictly Come Dancing contestant.

Sure, this may be what people want, and the NoW - employing the rationale of a pornographer - is merely satisfying their appetite. But the paper is considered to be part of the British press. If the rest of the nationals avert their gaze from its misdemeanours then it's no wonder that it goes on doing as it likes week after week, dragging us all through the mire.

And it is the reason that Kate McCann was crying with frustration a week ago at the wholly unwarranted use of her personal diaries.

And one of the comments:CloudCastleSep 23 08, 2:27pm (29 minutes ago)Roy,

What's your blind spot with the McCanns, or are you simply using them to have a go at Colin Myler?

Let's put aside this class-warfare nonsense, shall we? It doesn't matter what class the kids were. The McCann kids and those of the rest of their party were left alone in their apartments most nights of the week's holiday while their parents went out to dinner. Madeleine, at 3, was the eldest.

Do you, like Montaignac above, actually believe the McCanns' claims of an abduction? What piece of evidence makes you think this? The released police files show no evidence of an abduction. All that we have is a claim by Jane Tanner that she saw someone carrying a little girl, at a a time when both Gerry McCann and an independent witness say Tanner was not on the street. The waiting staff at the Tapas restaurant state she didn't leave the table. The police found no evidence of damage to the shutters or fingerprints other than those of Kate McCann and the handprint of a less than careful policeman. The only other sighting that supports the view that the child was carried away is that of Mr Smith, who says he is 60% certain the man he saw was Gerry.

(No opinions here, just evidence from the police files.)

On the other hand, we have sniffer dogs who indicate the odour of a dead body in the McCanns' apartment and hire car, on the car key, on Kate and Madeleine's clothing and on the child's soft toy. In no other cars or apartments searched did the dogs indicate odour or blood. Since being released from arguido/arguida status, the McCanns have failed to address any of the contradictions in their statements or the issues raised by the dogs, not least because the British press has not raised these questions with them.

Over the last eighteen months, we've witnessed how far the standards of British journalism have fallen. Sections of the UK press have merely cut and pasted the most outlandish claims not only of the Portugese press, but the McCann PR team. We've had endless sympathetic hand-wringing opinion columns from writers - I hesitate to call them journalists - who never leave their desks. We've had articles like this one by Roy - an article about an article about the retrospectively written teenage-ramblings of Kate McCann. We've had Lori Campbell in the Mirror pointing the finger at the wrong man, Robert Murat, and getting the Young Journalist of the Year Award for it. We've seen packs of journalists chasing sightings of little girls around the streets of Brussels.

Show me, please, one article in 2008 where the editor of a newspaper has given his reporter the freedom to investigate this case properly. Where are the interviews with the Tapas 7, whose stories simply contradict one another? Why have we seen no interview with Brian Kennedy, who bankrolled the McCanns and flew down to 'interview' Robert Murat? Why has no paper investigated how the Madeleine Fund, a limited company not a charity, has spent the hundreds of thousands of pounds sent to it from children, parents and grandparents from all over the world, details it refuses to make transparent?

Is investigative reporting just too hard for your colleagues today, Roy? Is it easier, not just cheaper, to regurgitate press releases or quote 'a friend of the family'?

Is that why, Roy, the press needs to highlight the sins of the News of the World? Is it because it's easier and cheaper than highlighting the sins of the McCanns?

Last year, 15,000 calls out of 95,000 made to the Helpline went unanswered. The charity aims to improve that statistic by training more counsellors and encouraging people to take action sooner through the appeal. The appeal will also raise money for the NSPCC's ChildLine service, which last year had 2.5m calls with 900,000 going unanswered.

Eileen Hayes, the NSPCC's parenting adviser. “I once left my baby in the car for a brief time and when I came back, a policeman was waiting for me,” she says. “It's not illegal but it was embarrassing, and if anything had happened I'd have been done for neglect.

------

And that was the extent of your concern, getting done for neglect? Not that your child could have been abducted or come to harm? At least a kind policeman bothered to show up to babysit, Mrs Parenting Adviser.

Monday

On the 6th of September, weekly Expresso published an exclusive interview with the McCann couple, with headlines that claimed, in direct speech, through Kate’s voice: “Gonçalo Amaral is a disgrace!” Twenty four hours earlier, the British daily The Sun presented an excerpt of the videos with the famous dogs (trained to react in the presence of human blood and cadaver odour, we recall) reacting in a particular manner under certain circumstances, namely in locations where the McCanns were, or to objects that had been in contact with the family (for example, the famous pink cuddle cat). These videos made the rounds in all tv stations and generated some upset.

Let’s ask: how are both situations related? Well, the time proximity may lead to suppose that, like we have stated in earlier occasions, these are situations that can be compared with guerrilla fights. I open a parenthesis to affirm that I am certain of the tolerance and good sense that are recognized in Dr Gonçalo Amaral, which continue to give him the strength and the wisdom to resist, along with his family, to this guerilla that will only intensify the confusion that is installed already.

What does this mean? It was to be presumed that after the process was made public there would be a tendency from the media to try to value some indicia that sustain the homicide and cadaver concealment theory, and that the response to that tendency would be translated into attacks on the Polícia Judiciária’s technical competence, and especially the devaluation of indicia without forensic corroboration.

Within this perspective, it did not surprise me that the reports were published almost simultaneously and that for the McCann couple, the criteria to interpret and explain the behaviour of the dogs were exclusively measured by these animals’ incompetence, supposedly proved by one single US study. Of course it is an argument, but once again, the argument of authority has prevailed over the authority of the argument. Is one single US study enough to devalue what the images have shown? Probably, the forensic artist who drew the photofits was also part of the team… (forgive me the irony)

It could also be confirmed, just like I had insisted, despite the legitimate and honest explanations from my dear friend Dr Rogério Alves during a debate on SIC Notícias in late July, that the couple had refused to “return to Portugal for the reconstitution” (in Expresso, Sept 9, 2008, page 25).

More recently, on the 14th of September, British tabloid “News of the World” announces, on the front page, the publication of “Kate’s Diary, in her own words” and advances an exclusive that will present, “for the first time, the devastating TRUTH that destroys the Portuguese police’s lies”. Competing with the usual appealing images of Britney Spears, Rachel Stevens and Danii Minogue, the front page presents a photo of Kate McCann with a sad and worried expression, which supposedly would anticipate the details of her agony that the diary would expose.

In reality, across four pages of the tabloid, with some photographs that illustrated the strong emotions, Kate’s diary was published and commented under the perspective of a mother in understandable despair. The comments followed the logics of the abduction theory, and in consequence carried out a violent attack on the Portuguese Polícia Judiciária, which is accused, among other things, of cruelty.

But why am I telling you this? Because following the supposedly incompetent olfactory work done by the dogs, on the 12th of July 2007, Kate registers the following in her diary: “Today I washed the Cuddle Cat. I was hoping not to have to do it until Madeleine returns, but it was now quite dirty and smelly, unfortunately without the smell of Madeleine on it” (News of the World, Sept 14, 2008, page 6).

This passage is admirable, when compared to the notion that the dogs’ role had to be diminished in the process!!!

The figure of cuddle cat has always claimed my attention in the Maddie case. Right at the beginning, I remembered a famous British paediatrician, Donald Winnicott, who attributed particular importance to toys (or other objects) that gain a special value for children in very precocious phases of their lives. These objects, which the paediatrician called transitional, are invested with particular passion by the children, or even with addiction, for possessing symbolic characteristics of safety, comfort, care and other qualities that emanate from the mother figure. It is almost always the mother who offers, or promotes, this relationship of passion with the object. Therefore, when she is absent or when the children, for example, go to bed or to nursery school, they absolutely need to enjoy the company of these objects. That is the only way that they can endure those moments. We all remember when our children could only sleep if they were hugging their soft toy.

But that object gradually loses that symbolic dimension, as new relational meanings emerge. Nevertheless, while the passion and the addiction over that object last, all its qualities should be maintained. One of them, very important: the scent. Who has never witnessed a child’s tantrum because she does not want her soft toy to be washed, even preferring it to remain dirty and smelly?

That’s right. I have never managed to understand who the pink cuddle cat belonged to…

But I’m certain of one thing: it’s a lot more important than it seems.

Even after being washed, when Kate could not feel Maddie’s scent anymore, and placed, untouched, in the little bed where it slept, the dogs felt a presence.

I finish for the day with a sentence by Professor José Pinto da Costa (whom I was honoured to be a student of) that was spoken during the aforementioned debate: “I see that I still have a lot to learn about those sniffer dogs’ biology”.

Thousands of children disappear annually in Europe. An EU-wide alert system is designed to simplify the search. But it is controversial.

The appearance of Gerry and Kate McCann in April before the EU Parliament in Brussels was not without effect. The parents of Madeleine who disappeared in the summer of 2007 from a Portuguese resort asked the MPs to work for an EU-wide alarm system. With success: A large majority of the people's representatives showed their support. The model provides that police, border surveillance and media in all EU member states are immediately informed whenever a child is reported missing. The Member States should decide until December whether they want the system or not.

Federal Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries (SPD) has already objected. It does not help the police investigation, if for example missing ads regarding a kidnapped child in southern Italy are run in Danish media, she argued. "Not every missing child has to be searched for across Europe," said the minister. Actually in Germany 98% of the annual 70 000 child reported missing were found again within a few days. "Most cases are runaways," says Lars Bruhns.

This is not the only reason why the Chief Executive of the Missing Children Organization, which belongs also to the European umbrella organisation Missing Children Europe, is critical of an EU-wide alarm system: "I see big problems with the technical implementation. Therefore first and foremost the implementation of the EU emergency number in all Countries has to be stepped up."

Bruhns thus hits a sore point. Because the 2006 in Brussels decided, uniform hotline 11 60 00 has so far been established in only five countries. The EU Commission now urges now all countries to establish the number. Also Germany is not yet running this Children's emergency (hotline). Instead there is since 2006 their own "Amber" alarm system . Whoever wants to can register and receive SMS and MMS information on missing persons cases. The alarm is triggered only when the authorities assume that the missing child is in danger.

If leaving your children at home unsupervised is fraught with difficulty, can we ever risk leaving them asleep with the monitor on in a foreign hotel? The memory of Madeleine McCann will remain with parents of young children for decades, says Rhodes.

“People are much more nervous on holiday now - but in Britain we value our time away from our babies, so we live with monitors. It is highly unlikely that anyone would break into a hotel room, and if your child is a light sleeper and you can get back to her in minutes you might take that risk,” she says. “But if you don't take her, you may spend all of dinner worrying.”

1. Cadaver dogs signalled at a number of places in the apartment and around the car (but re the latter, the only material found did not elicit the response). Blood dogs signalled in both the apartment and the car.

2. There was a 99.9% certain DNA match with Madeleine in the hire car - the Renault Scenic.[This is my (and others') interpretation of press reports of the evidence file which refer to the match involving identification of 15 out of 19 DNA markers (the four outstanding being too degraded for analysis). However, this is a controversial area as the FSS issued a downbeat summary of the evidence. But that was couched in such general terms that it is difficult to see how it justifies the match being ignored. Clearly this matter cannot be fully resolved until we have access to the full evidence file.] Amaral, the leading police investigator at the time the FSS reached its conclusion, stated in interview with Hola (12.9.08) "the girl’s blood was found as well as in a car rented 23 days later".

Also [thanks to Cati] Apartment 5A: Eddie, the 'cadaver dog' and Keela, the 'blood dog' marked on the same local: behind the sofa (which according to the PJ was moved by the McCanns). The tiles were removed and sent to FSS. The blood found by keela was degraded and the lab was able to check only 5 markers. They ALL matched madeleine's DNA.

So all the forensic evidence is fully compatible with the parental involvement theory.

3. KMC refused to answer 48 questions put to her by PJ.

4. Among the questions asked of both GMC and KMC were questions enquiring as to whether they had considered relinquishing their parenting rights over Madeleine i.e. putting her up for guardianship by a relative, or for adoption. KMC refused to answer. GMC appears to have denied that was the case. Not clear what grounds the PJ had for asking this question.

5. MMC's bed appeared to be relatively undisturbed. Some accounts suggest there was no evidence of it having been slept in. Other accounts note the shape of a sleeping child. I wonder at the fact that the parents did not throw back the cover to look for signs of blood or a kidnap note.

6. From photographs it does appear that the window would be a difficult egress point. (However that is hardly of much relevance to the general credibility of an abduction scenario given there could be an accomplice.)

7. Kate and Gerry had a serious row on the night of 2nd May/morning of 3rd May. Kate slept in children's room. (Claims she slept in cot. But one poster suggests perhaps she slept with Maddy in her bed.)

8. Two doctors (one a close college friend of KMC) made a serious allegation about one of the Tapas 7 and GMC. The witness statement made early in May was not passed by UK Police to PJ for seven months, until Jan 08.

9. McCanns refused to return for reconstruction because they feared prosecution for negligence.

10. KMC threatened PJ with "government pressure" if they took her in for formal questioning.

11. Portugese Prosecutors produced an incredible "pro" summary of the evidence. They ruled out negligence charges on the basis that the McCanns had "suffered enough already". Interesting legal concept. Surely applies to all parents who lose their children as a result of negligence. [Do any Portugese commentators wish to add to this?]

12. Brian Kennedy approached Martin Smith key witness who had identified GMC carrying a child on 3rd May. Presumably he did so on behalf of the McCanns rather than himself (since he has not been accused of anything). [Personally I think witness statements dating from Sept 07 supposedly relating back to May 07 are worthless.]

Amaral wanted to have the Irishman return to Portugal for questioning re his later identification of the man carrying a child towards the beach on the night of Madeleine's disappearance. The PJ did include Martin Smith in the rogatory letters sent to the Home Office, but because of his domicile in the Republic of Ireland was not legally covered for re-questioning by the Leicestershire police.

13. There was some sort of large cold bag in the boot of the Scenic. Photos have appeared showing the bag. It appears to have some relevance to the DNA sampling but no confirmation on that yet.

14. Jane Tanner appears to have changed her evidence. Whereas on the Panorama programme (made with her co-operation and with respect to which she made no correction) Gerry McCann and Jes Wilkins were shown as standing on the other side of the road as she passed, her drawing of relative positions contained in the evidence file shows they were on the same side of the road. She must therefore have passed directly by them. However she has given no indication that she said hello to GMC - which if she did not is remarkable. JW denies seeing her. GMC has never said he saw her as far as we know [now confirmed in evidence].

Apparently JW now thinks he could have his back to the top of the road and so would not have seen "bundleman". Not really relevant in any case. But of course if he was talking to GMC one might expect GMC to be facing the other way in which case he too should have seen bundleman.

15. Frances Kennah, the Head of UK Central Authority,Home Office refused a request from PJ for details of GMC's ATM cards on the grounds that the request was disproportionate. (Homicide is clearly not considered a very important matter in the UK Central Authority.)

16. Catriona Baker, Maddy's personal nanny, stated that the McCanns did no searching for Madeleine on the night of 3rd/4th May. She also stated that Maddy became frightened and started crying when she was taken on a boat trip in PDL. Now appears that Maddy is confirmed by the nannies as being part of the boat trip party on morning of 3rd May. [Note: This is still a matter of some controversy. There appear as yet to be no details of Catriona Baker's witness statement. No Tapas 7 members claim to have seen Madeleine on 3rd May, except perhaps for David Payne, visiting early evening, though he does not mention her by name.]No confirmatory photos though. May be a lot more to add on the day's events. Only fingerprints found on the window frame in Maddeleine's bedroom (the one with the infamous so-called jemmied shutter) were Kate McCann's. No sign of any abductor entering or exiting via that window!

17. Cuddlecat photographed as being on Madeleine's bed. No sign of any high shelf, as originally described by Kate McCann. However, it is not known whether she claims to have taken it down from the "high shelf" and then put it back on the bed where it would normally be found.

18. PJ were concerned about the four photographs of Madeleine said to have been downloaded from a digital camera and printed by Gerry McCann on the night of her disappearance on a printer at the Ocean Club. PJ maintain that they could not have been rinted there in that format. However: [Thanks to Paulo Reis] The printer used for the pictures of Madeleine belonged to a British member of the staff of Ocean Club. She brought it from her room to the reception. The pictures were printed using a memory card given to her by Russel O'Brien, around midnight. PJ wanted to check the printer, but she said that her boyfriend took it with him,to France. Anyway, experts from the PJ Laboratory considered that it was almost impossible to get a specific "fingerprint" from the pictures produced by that kind of printer.

19. Metodo 3, once hired, concentrated its early efforts on Robert Murat in its search for Madeleine, but the PJ found their evidence "speculative and without basis."

20. Rachael Mampilly Oldfield was the person who contacted the BBC, at around 2 a.m. on the morning of May 4th, to report the disappearance of Madeleine. No mention of the Sky TV contact.

21. KMC is reported by a Tapas 7 friend as hitting the wall in frustration at Maddy's disappearance. It is stated this caused bruising. No explanation of how far this bruising spread.

22. [Thanks to Paulo Reis] Gerry's fury: When GNR arrived, Gerry McCann walked to them, kneeled down and put both his hands in the ground, in the same position as a Muslim praying, and shouted twice, with rage in his voice, saying something that the witnesses close to them could not understand. Note: Interesting observation - Freemason sign is to raise both hands in the air, palm forwards. Possibly consistent with this gesture? - which might otherwise be considered unusual for a professional person of his background. However, this is pure speculation.

23. Tanner and O'Brien left their 11 month old baby whom they knew to be ill (restless, unable to sleep) in the apartment with its sibling. They went off to enjoy themselves with friends.

24. Tanner claims to have known that GMC was on the way back from 5A when she "saw" him and Jeremy Wilkins talking together.

25. Not clear, but possible Tanner may have been claiming that she saw the abductor emerging from the alley (rear of the property).

26. Both Tanner and O'Brien were (by Tanner's admission to the Police) very close to the crime scene around the relevant time.

27. Tanner did not use a mobile phone to contact her partner when Oldfield informed her that O'B was staying at the apartment because their 11 month old baby was unwell. She hurried to finish her meal and then went to rejoin her partner, O'Brien at about 9.40.

28. Tanner's account to police about how she heard of Maddy's disappearance is at slight but significant variance from the Panorama account. In Panorama, she hears a commotion, opens the door and is then informed in a matter of fact way by FP that "Maddy's gone." In the interview statement, it appears she heard both KMC and FP screaming that Madeleine had been taken whilst still in the flat. An odd discrepancy, made odder by the fact that the Panorama account sounds singularly unconvincing.

29. [Thanks to Vanilla Biscuit] There were early reports that 2 of the Tapas men were tired on the evening of the 3rd because they had been out rowing that afternoon, but those reports had been whoosh-clunked and very few other posters seemed to remember them, but it is confirmed in Tanner's statement: 'At 2.45, after she had finished playing tennis, JT went back to her apartment where she stayed with her daughter Evie.Her husband and Matthew Oldfield had gone sailing.'

30. Kate McCann confirms that JT revealed her claimed sighting of the abductor on the night of 3rd/4th May and she was aware of it. There is no indication that this led to any particular focus for the search.

31. [Thanks to Swannie for this observation.]According to Payne's April 2008 statement in Leics (from Paulo Reis http://gazetadigitalmadeleinecase.blogs ...):-

"David knocked at the A5 apartment about 6:30pm. Kate had JUST FINISHED HAVING A BATH and David saw that the kids were already bathed and were in their pyjamas, playing around. It was Gerry who asked him to check on Kate and the kids, Payne told Police. According to Kate, David knocked at the door (the door facing the swimming pool). She just put a towel around her, went to the living room and they had a brief talk."

Yet according to Kate's statement taken on May 4th 2007:

"Yesterday, after the daily routine, Madeleine and the twins went to bed at around 7.30. They were in their respective beds. The interviewee and her husband stayed in their apartment to relax until 8.30pm. SHE TOOK A BATH did her make-up and drank a glass of New Zealand wine with her husband."

32. Video of Eddie and Keela (highly skilled at detecting cadaver/blood scents) at work has been released. Shows that the dogs' indications were very clear. On the basis that studies have shown accuracy in the 90-100% range (taking a 95% figure), the mathematical chances of them mis-identifying 7 locations [note - I think it was 7 separate locations - to be double checked] is 64 million to one. It appears there is no evidence of the dogs having mis-identified in any other case.

33. Amaral has indicated during a speech in Madrid that : "The PJ was forced to issue a press release [on 5th May 2007] announcing the abduction of Madeleine" . John Buck, the British Ambassador in Lisbon at the time of Madeleine McCann’s disappearance went to Portimão to demand that the PJ immediately announce to the media – especially the British media – that the disappearance of Madeleine was an abduction and that her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann were two innocent victims. According to sources close to the British Embassy in Lisbon, the Ambassador John Buck, previous to this intervention at the PJ in Faro and Portimão, has already discussed the affair with the Portuguese Minister for Foreign Affairs.

Clarrie nonsense shown to be rubbish:

1. Dutch sighting of Ms. Stam. Dutch Police did investigate and passed conclusions to PJ. Dutch Police ruled there was no possibility the girl in question was Madeleine. [Sure there will be more to follow on this - the fact that Dutch Police were certain about this, suggests perhaps the Dutch Police know something about Ms. Stam or her report that we don't. Can any Dutch posters help? Update: Disparaging posts about Ms. Stam have been left on a Dutch website by someone claiming to be a neighbour of hers. Not known if these are genuine.]

3. Interpol confirm there is no credibility to the UK tip off of a Belgian paedo ring "ordering up" Maddy. Clarrie's attempt to imply this was ignored is shown to be a complete and utter pack of whatever.

4. Sky News' Greg Milam confirms that all CCTV "Maddy" images have been followed up by PJ and none have any credibility. While he reports this the CCTV still of a young girl that was used by UK press with the Miss Stam story was shown - suggesting that the coupling of that with the Stam story (on many websites and in newspapers) was indeed COMPLETELY BOGUS.

5. Even the McCanns are now reported as reluctant to commit to sightings. Hardly surprising given the history of such sightings.

6. Clarrie has in previous interviews claimed there was confusion about the timings and that this was understandable because all (or,later, many) of the Tapas 9 did not have watches or mobile phones with them. It is clear from the statements that NONE of those interviewed claim any great difficulty in determining the timing of their movements on the evening of 3rd May.

7. On the appearance of "The Truth About the Lie" Clarence Mitchell said that lawyers are studying Amaral's book as a "matter of urgency".

"Mr Amaral will face immediate and swift legal action if he in any way implies, either directly or indirectly, that Kate and Gerry were involved in the disappearance or harming of their daughter," he said.

Amelie McCann: "Maddie's jammies. Where is Maddie?"

"Why would anyone take a photograph of their daughter's pyjamas before she is abducted? It is not one for the family album. Its only purpose could be to support and encourage a search for the missing child. BUT THEY DIDN'T KNOW SHE WAS MISSING UNTIL 10 o'clock THAT NIGHT. OR did they? If Madeleine McCann's pyjamas were not in fact abducted, then nor was Madeleine McCann."

Gerry McCann calls for example to be made of 'vile' internet trolls

Brenda Leyland was doorstepped on 2 October 2014 by Sky reporter Martin Brunt who accused her of 'attacking' the McCanns. On Friday the mainstream press attacked Brenda without mercy. The next day she was found dead in a Leicester hotel room having, apparently, taken her own life.

The McCanns 'Dossier of Death' led directly to the suicide of Brenda Leyland

The author of that disgraceful Dossier can be easily identified, and comes as no surprise. Brenda Leyland paid the price. She paid with her life.

McCanns forced Gonçalo and Sofia Amaral to divorce in order to seize his assets

"This litigation will carry a heavy price"

Richard D. Hall: 'When Madeleine Died?'

Please click on image to view all three Madeleine films

Campeão das Províncias: "Do you think the reopening of the process is possible?"

Gonçalo Amaral: "I remind you that the McCanns “demanded” the archiving of the process, in 2008, when they were arguidos, merely to defend their image. They are not interested in the reopening of the process or of the investigation"

Kate and Gerry McCann

Have never requested the re-opening of the investigation into Madeleine's disappearance.

Handbook of Masonry, page 183

You must conceal all crimes of your brother Masons...and should you be summoned as a witness against a brother Mason be always sure to shield him...It may be perjury to do this, it is true, but you're keeping your obligations.

Adam Tudor - Carter Ruck

Adam joined Carter-Ruck in 2001 and became a Partner in 2003. In libel circles, Adam is best known for representing Kate and Gerry McCann in their libel and privacy complaints.

Carter Ruck

Innocent Victims

Secret Trafigura

Carter Ruck silence the enemies

Secret McCann

Carter Ruck silence the enemies

Maddie: The Truth of the Lie

Translated into English

Daughter missing. What would you do?

And so the story of Madeleine McCann begins, as told in their own words...

"Cheer up Gerry, we're on holiday"

"Fuck off, I'm not here to enjoy myself."

Gerry McCann in Lisbon

"There's no evidence that Madeleine is dead and there's no evidence to implicate us in her death"

Dr David Payne, Leicester Royal Infirmary

Majorca, September 2005: Dr Katherina Gaspar witnesses a scene with David Payne and Gerry McCann which flabbergasts her and makes her fear for the safety of her daughter and the other children.

Kate McCann

"My struggle to control 'very difficult' Madeleine"

Eileen McCann

"That girl could throw a tantrum if she wanted to"

Question 41

"Is it true that in England you even considered handing over Madeleine’s custody to a relative?"

Manuel Catriano

“This story did not begin in the Ocean Club, but in London where the official truth was conspired and established: an English girl was kidnapped in the Algarve”

Honorary Chief Commissioner of the National French Police

"Today, the only person prosecuted in the case of the disappearance of little Madeleine McCann is the officer who conducted the investigation. "

Gonçalo Amaral

“I feel accomplished. It is the feeling of fulfilled duty, but there is something more, that I cannot speak about, of justice being carried out and the truth being discovered. These are not wishes, they are principles, I’m not speaking about any specific case.”

"Mummy, why didn't you come when we were crying last night?"

Don't you forget about me either

"Soon, very soon, the world will know the truth about the lie and we will gain truth and justice for a little girl who has no voice, dead on the evening of May 3rd "

Note of Despair

“Prior to the PJ arriving at 12:40/12:50 Russell O'Brien has written the timeline for them all, including, ‘Jane tanner sees stranger walking carrying child.’ He does this while Gerry McCann sits at the same table. At three o' clock in the morning Jane Tanner informs Gerry McCann for the first time, about the existence of a possible abductor.”

the bottom line is....

...that Kate McCann was in Apartment 5A when Madeleine cried for her father between 22.30 and 23.45 on Tuesday 1st May 2007, leading to a unique flurry of late night calls and to unique calls very early the following morning."

I don't want to dwell on it too much

"...that means that, you know, she must have fallen back asleep very quickly, errm... and then she moved on… you know, she moved on."

Witness Martin Smith

In Ireland, the Smiths are watching the BBC news, which is broadcasting the event. For them, it's a shock: that person, they recognise him. That way of carrying his child, that way of walking. From that moment, he is sure: the man they came across that night was Gerald McCann. Of that there is very little doubt.

The arrival of the specialists

The hypothesis of death is considered

Whoosh!

The Article Team McCann Didn't Want You To Read

Martin Grime, dog handler

"The dog's behaviour for these alerts led me to the following opinions. The first alert was given with the dog’s head in the air without a positive area being identified. This is the alert given by him when there is no tangible evidence to be located [i.e. a physical corpse], only the remaining scent."

Death scent and blood

Found on Kate's trousers, Cuddlecat, child's red tshirt, behind the sofa, in the wardrobe and in the car the McCanns hired 25 days after Maddie disappeared.

Blood on curtains in 5A

The dogs detected cadaver odour behind a couch in the apartment’s living room, close to a window that leads to the resort’s back area. This window had curtains that were removed and analysed by police, and a small blood sample was detected. Both the curtains and the wall where it was located at, had been washed.

It means, the McCanns planned the death of their daughter?

Lüdke: "Yes, it is possible that they planned this a long time ago, they must at least have played it through in their minds many times and they must have spoken about it together. Otherwise they would now be contradicting each other."

Sandra Felgueiras asks the McCanns about the cadavar dogs

Gerry McCann, father of 'abducted' Maddie: 'Ask the dogs, Sandra'

Eddie and Keela

Pride of South Yorkshire

Gerry McCann

CEOP Approved Guest Speaker

'According to you, what happened on May 3, 2007?

Madeleine McCann died from accidentally falling behind the sofa in the living room of the apartment. That couch had been moved when the alarm over the alleged disappearance was raised. I think that someone discovered the body, concealed it, cleaned everything up and pushed the sofa to the window.' Gonçalo Amaral

Gonçalo Amaral

"As far as I’m concerned, I commit myself to embody the hopes of all of you, and not to give up, despite the survival of my own family being at stake, but the defence of those values and principles is essential."

If they had found DNA – so what?

If Madeleine had hurt herself inside the apartment – why would that be our fault?

Gonçalo Amaral

"Let's remember: it is totally logical to find Madeleine's DNA in the home, but absolutely not in a car rented more than twenty days after her disappearance."

Do you think the body was refrigerated?

Gonçalo Amaral: "Yes. The bodily fluid in the car shows that. If the body had been buried there would have been mummification. The fact that there were fluids points to refrigeration."

On the 28th of September 2007

it was claimed by the police in Portugal that they believed Kate McCann killed Madeleine whilst putting her to bed at their holiday apartment in Praia da Luz between 7pm and 8.30pm on May 3 2007 and then hid her corpse in a fridge. This they allege was done with the help of friends.

Daily Express: 13.09.07

"Find the body and prove we killed her"

Gonçalo Amaral

"I am brought the witness statement of a neighbour, according to whom, the McCanns left their car boot open all the time. For Gerry's brother-in-law, the bad smell was explained by the fact that the McCanns transported their bins in it. As for the blood, it had been left by a piece of meat fallen out of a shopping bag. Kate's cousin explained that the unpleasant smells were due to the little ones' dirty nappies."

Michael Wright, relative of McCanns

"I noted some disagreeable smells on a number of occasions which I judged to have come from the twins’ nappies. I have no knowledge of anything spilling from any article nor of any cleaning of the car after such a hypothetical spill."

"The priests also know very well what happened that night.”

John Geraghty, leicester businessman

Obtained the keys to the church and offered to store the McCanns hire car.

Sean and the Sea Bass

Sean subsequently developed a taste for Sea Bass which can produce cadaverine under some circumstances

Lawyer João Grade

“I read his book and I was convinced, as I had been before, anyway, that it was not an abduction. But the book does not defame the McCanns, Gonçalo Amaral does not express his opinion in it, but an investigation thesis”,

McCann twins: We will fight man who took our sister Maddie

'The twins both know the person who took Madeleine has done something very bad' - even though they were asleep at the time.

Eddie Stobart joins the search for Maddie

"Someone, somewhere, knows where Maddie is"

The exploitation of Madeleine

A gallery of obscenities

Books found in McCanns bedside cabinet

"Still, there is no denying the quality of the liaison, with guidance, in the form of police manuals, later finding its way onto Gerry McCann's bedside cabinet."

Discrediting Martin Grime and Eddie & Keela

David Rose once admitted that his pre-Iraq war reports were based on propaganda fed to him by the security services

McCanns and the Eugene Zapata case

The dogs were right all along

Murdered pensioner Attracta Harron

Eddie found her body in a shallow grave and Keela detected her blood in a burnt out car five months after she was murdered

Humans dug up coconut where Eddie alerted to cadaver

Martin Grime: 'People aren't right 100 per cent of the time. Otherwise they wouldn't be human.'

Questions: Tavares Almeida interviewed Kate McCann

"From what has been established up to now, everything indicates that the McCann couple, in self-defence, doesn’t want to deliver the cadaver immediately and voluntarily, and there is a strong possibility that it was moved from the initial place of deposition."

Forensic Science Service

Stu "hope you are well" Prior

Leicester police chief hits back at Gonçalo Amaral

"I can assure you that at no time were statements withheld and not passed on." Oh, really? Let's have a look then shall we?

One of the withheld statements by Dr Katherina Gaspar

I was seated between Dave and Gerry who I believe were both speaking about Madeleine. I don’t remember the conversation in its entirety, but it seemed they were discussing a possible scenario. I remember Dave telling Gerry something like “she”, referring to Madeleine, “would do this”.. When he mentioned “this”, Dave was sucking on one of his fingers, pushing it inside and outside his mouth, while with the other hand he made a circle around his nipple, in a circulatory movement over his clothes. This was done in a provocative manner and carried an explicit insinuation in relation to what he was saying and doing. I remember that I was shocked at this, and looked at Gerry, and also at Dave, to see their reactions. I looked around as if saying “did anyone else hear this, or was it just me”. There was a nervous silence registered in all the conversations and afterwards, everyone began talking again.

Innocent parents?

Those nasty police questions: Leaving No Stone Unturned

"My plan was to stay quiet and not answer."

Those 48 questions: Leaving No Stone Unturned

“Are you aware that in not answering the questions you are jeopardising the investigation, which seeks to discover what happened to your daughter?” Kate: “Yes, if that’s what the investigation thinks.”

The cancelled police reconstruction

"Kate and Gerry and their friends cannot see the point of all the disruption it would cause to their busy work schedules and families if, as they believe, it will do absolutely nothing to help find Madeleine"

The cancelled reenactment

Shocking emails from Tapas 7 to Leicestershire Constabulary

Channel 4: Madeleine was here

McCann's chose to do their own reenactment, despite disruption to their busy schedules

Do you maintain your conviction that Madeleine McCann was killed in Aldeia da Luz?

Francisco Moita Flores: "I do. There are no material conditions to opt for another solution. The mystery lies with one or two of the ten or twelve elements that used to enter that apartment".

The search for Maddie

Hampered by Gonçalo Amaral's book

Gerry's key alibi, Jes Wilkins

And his connection to Donal MacIntyre

The journalist and the film maker

They walked past the press, sniffer dogs, police to get to the shops. But they didn't get involved. They didn't help. They just watched.

John McCann

How did he know Maddie wouldn't be found soon after he gave up his full time job to be a director of the Fund, despite having a mortgage and a family to support?

John McCann

"It's not bad for a bunch of amateurs"

The wider agenda

Gerry works on the Fund Campaign

McCann Fund Fraud

John McCann spoke briefly to us on the phone until he realised we were asking about the Fund. His response was to claim we had the wrong telephone number and that he was in fact a “Mr Jones”.

The Fraudulent Fund

Click image to read about how the McCanns spent your money

Why don't the McCanns advertise the reward?

Click image to find out

Child neglect pays

A profitable business, even if a child has died.

From Papal to Paypal

Clarence Mitchell

"I am a decent human being"

Clarence Mitchell lies on NZ Radio

“Anybody who has given money to help find Madeleine need have no fear that their money is being spent on lawyers fees or anything like that.”

McCanns used Maddie Fund

To pay their mortgage

What was your most memorable experience as a lawyer?

"Naturally it would be pretty hard to top Mr and Mrs McCann’s victory against Express Group."

Kate and Gerry set to sue Gonçalo Amaral

Ed Smethurst, McCanns lawyer

“We are currently demanding €1.2 million in damages, but we are reserving the right to increase this value as soon as we can ascertain what profits have been generated from the sale of this book” (which, presumably, is why you didn't sue as soon as the book was released...)

Do you fear that Gonçalo may be forced to pay the compensation that is being demanded by the McCann

"I don’t think that is possible, we will appeal until the last instances."

Maddie 'treated as a commodity'

Says Gerry who referred to Maddie's eye defect as a good marketing ploy and has an online Maddie shop

Maddie's Online Shop

Where you can buy wristbands, tshirts, and travel packs so YOU can look for Maddie while her parents concentrate on fundraising, suing people and paying their mortgage with the money you give them.

But it was a "good marketing ploy"

"If that situation had been of an abduction, it would have been terrible for the child. Because if that child were to be sold, or something else... She was as good as... it was her death sentence. That situation, that day, advertising that photo, was simply the death sentence of that child." Carlos Anjos

Kate McCann

"I can't stop thinking about Madeleine, about her fear of pain"

"Be brave, sweetheart"

"Whoever Madeleine's with she'll be giving them her tuppence worth"

Maddie Mystery

The Key Questions

Maria Bandeirinha, business owner Praia da Luz

“Kate passed by my door, laughing her head off, with a friend, days after her daughter disappeared. What mother has a child in an unknown location and feels like laughing?"

Kate's favourite prop

Cuddlecat, smelling of death scent from 6 corpses due to Kate taking it to work with her before their fateful holiday, arrives at Portimao police station for questioning

Susan Healy feels her daughter is being persecuted because of her appearance

“Kate said last night ‘If I weighed another two stone, had a bigger bosom and looked more maternal, people would be more sympathetic’,”

What, like this you mean?

McCanns ban Maddie book

Gonçalo Amaral: "I am not shutting up"

Goncalo Amaral’s new book:‘A Mordaça Inglesa’ (The English Gag)

In his second book, The English Gag, he suggests there is something significant about a pink blanket which he claims disappeared on the night the three-year-old vanished from the resort of Praia da Luz in 2007.

Portuguese Attorney General Fernando Pinto Monteiro

One way or another the McCanns were responsible for their child’s death

McCanns: October 2007

"Madeleine is probably dead"

Gonçalo Amaral:

"Too much politics, that's what there was, too much politics and not enough policing."

McCanns: Amaral's documentary will never be shown in England

In England, the documentary was attentively watched on the Internet (---) by those who wanted to watch what they know no channel in the country will broadcast.

Dr Paulo Sargento, Forensic Psychologist

Gonçalo Amaral is the visible target the McCanns want to take down

Marcos Aragão Correia,

"'Target was hit, Gonçalo Amaral was convicted'

Journalist Robert Mendick

“A further obstacle was removed with the death from stomach cancer two weeks ago of Guilhermino Encarnacao, who was in charge of the Policia Judiciaria in the Algarve."

The McCanns' private detectives, Metodo3

Extortion and attempted murder - and that's just the detectives

Kate McCann

"It's funny, we were having such a good time. We were with our friends and their kids. I think cos there was a group of us, you're just into each other, d'you know what I mean, you're kind of and your interactions are with each other, whereas maybe if it'd just been me, Gerry and the kids, erm, you spend a bit more time looking round, you know."

Kate McCann and the Millennium Restaurant

"It was just because the walk was so long and we didn't have a buggy and the kids were tired by that time."

'Blair covering up paedophile scandal?'

Smiling for the paedophiles

"I think some paedophile or some other swine has taken Madeleine. Madeleine is a warm, life-enriching little person and will never fail we're sure, to bring joy into the life of anyone she may encounter."

FRAGMENT OF CLOTH recovered from BEDSPREAD

1 piece of cloth in envelope n° 5 recovered from the bedspread of the bed next to the window in the children's bedroom. Fragment of cloth, mauve/violet in colour with square motifs, circular in form about 10cm in diameter. A small fluorescent spot is observed under a Crime-light.

Gonçalo Amaral

"there were gestures and words indicating the existence of a child molester within that group of people"

Dr David Payne, Leicester Royal Infirmary

"We have a pact. This is our matter only. It is nobody else's business"

Fiona Payne

"Erm, erm, I’m thirty, I’ll work that out actually, I’m thirty-five years old. I work as an Anaesthetist at Leicester and Leicester Registrar. I’m married to David Payne."

Index of Official Files & Statements

Yvonne Warren Martin further states that one of her main aims when she wrote the anonymous letter was for the British police to check the paedophile or child abusers registers to see if David Payne is on that list.

The McCanns televised reconstruction for profit

"It would be interesting to know the reason why Mr David Payne is not taking part in the reconstitution. He might explain for how long he bathed the children and at what time."

Linda McQueen with Gerry McCann

"The family had a great routine - their mealtimes, bedtimes and bathtimes in particular were great fun."

Gerry McCann: "The situation Madeleine finds herself in"

Dr David Payne suspected of paedophilia

"Mummy, I've had the best day ever"

Maddie was “so beautiful, astonishingly bright, and I’d have to say very charismatic. She would shine out of a crowd. So—God forgive me—maybe that’s part of the problem. That special quality. Some bastard picked up on that.” Jon Corner

Raymond 'patsy' Hewlett

"A paedo a day keeps the PJ away": Paulo Reis

Robert 'patsy' Murat

Framed by NHS doctors Kate and Gerry McCann

Detective Sousa

"There is one piece of stand alone evidence"

The criminal law does not protect children

"They are being left to sleep alone, while the parents get drunk at social gatherings, falling from windows and balconies like ripe fruit, or drying inside vehicles without the according penal sanction occurring"

Kate explains to Oprah

"It was so dark...it was dark, erm I've never had such a long night it was dark and you're just praying for the light you know to come up to get out there it's just..."

Rachel Oldfield on checking the young children who were left alone in a dark apartment

"I didn’t really like going up there by myself, it was, like going through that car park was quite dark and there was never anyone around, it was a bit, you know made me feel a bit uneasy”

McCann's internet appeal: "Imagine if she was your child"

"Imagine being Madeleine in a pitch black room, in a foreign country crying out for your parents who are out on the piss every night."

Rachel Oldfield: Maddie's 'abduction'

"If you take the common sense approach and look at timings and the fact they are medics and there are four other medics in the group, they would know what to do to resuscitate a child."

Rachael Oldfield

"So basically we’d go and have dinner and then we’d sort of run back you know every fifteen twenty minutes and have a listen at the door and make sure nobody’s screaming their head off”.

Dr Russell O'Brien

Left the table some time after 9pm to attend to his own daughter, who had become ill with vomiting

Not a liar or a fantasist, she insists

A witness of sorts...

Timeline of staged abduction

From official police files

Find Madeleine Fund

Now a non-governmental organisation

Jim Gamble, CEOP

Did not send your photos to the Portuguese Police

Interview by Kazlux

Bloggers interview Sofia Leal and Gonçalo Amaral

Basta!

Portuguese citizens fight back

Scarred town tries to forget

Ocean Club

Killer doctors

In the UK a "dishonest, malevolent doctor" could still get away with murder

Dr Gerry McCann

Is Doctor Gerry McCann fit to continue working as a doctor?

Dr Gerry McCann still working at Glenfield Hospital

Suspected of concealing his daughter's body

Father Pacheco

“There are two completely different Pachecos, the one before the McCanns and this shell of a man after the McCanns. He is a nervous wreck.”

Tony Blair and Gordon Brown

Leicestershire Police refuse FOI requests

John Stalker, former Deputy Chief Constable

From Kate McCann's diary:

"Rome is preparing itself for our visit"

Oprah's 'Kate and Gerry' chatroom

Like Rome, Oprah is preparing herself for the McCanns

Gerry McCann, the devout Catholic said:

"Sometimes people do things for reasons that even they cannot understand. An act of madness, an accident or sudden impulse can lead to consequences that people may never have imagined or intended. Faced with such a situation we believe any human soul will ultimately suffer torment and feelings of guilt and fear.”

Susan Healy

"Kate phoned me, errm… about an hour after Gerry and asked me to get in touch with, errm… Paul Seddon, who is the priest, Father Seddon, who married her, who baptised Madeleine, errm… and I didn't have his mobile phone so I rang a friend of Kate's and got… got him and he rang Kate right away and I think as soon as this happened, as soon as Kate realised what had happened, it was as if, errm.. she started to ask God right away to give her Madeleine. Errm… because Kate and Gerry were not the most devout family."

Books found in McCann's apartment

Kate McCann: "You know, there isn't a text book that tells you what to do when your child has been abducted". (Except for the 'Missing and Abducted Children' text book found in your bedside drawer, of course.)

“Yes, yes, I know,” Gerry says bitterly.

“Kate killed her in a frenzy, Madeleine was sedated by us, she fell down the stairs—in which case you would have thought they’d have found her body. I’ve heard all that! There have been a huge number of theories in the media. But what I want to know is—who told them all that?”

Gonçalo Amaral with Guilhermino Encarnacao

The man who became known in the investigation for having prevented Gonçalo Amaral from carrying out the interrogation of Kate McCann at a moment when she was, according to several inspectors who were present on location, “ready to talk”